I was talking to my mother about something that happened at work. I was extremely frustrated by a lack of consideration and was having difficulty troubleshooting next steps. She patiently informed me that my spinning out was unbelievably harmful to me and no one else. I responded that I understood that, but after we hung up, I realized that I didn’t really take that sentiment to heart.
I think that many of us spend an awful lot of time stuck with the following notions:
- My harm will be impactful on others
- Others are directly responsible for my harm and/or bad decisions
- I have no control over other people’s behavior and therefore, I have no control over my suffering
- If I find a way to share my suffering with others, I will feel better
- When I share my suffering with others, they will be able to support me without any impact on them
Bahahahaha.
Sorry. I had to. I used to feel this way also. I used to believe all the thoughts I shared above. I no longer do and it’s because I have experienced profound suffering because of these misguided notions. As you might imagine, I’d like to explore each of those thoughts to maybe get to the point where you also don’t subscribe to them.
The first one is a toughie. One of the most challenging aspects is that when we move away from that particular belief, we tend to swing radically in the other direction. Sometimes, we just contemplate the swing and what that would mean, only to find the ‘what if’ so depressing that we make a choice to stay far, far away. What do I mean by that? Well, the assumed opposite of our harm impacting others is our suffering having no impact at all. Basically stated, that means that the people surrounding us don’t give a shit about us, at all. Our suffering is inconsequential in the greater scheme of their lives. This apathy is too much for us to contemplate or bear, so we move in the other direction. We cling to the notion that our harm will absolutely be impactful.
Great. Awesome. What happens when we have to face that this is not a true statement? Well, it shatters us, but not in the way that you would think. Sure, some folks swing to that ‘everyone sucks’ standpoint. Some, however, spend their time agonizing over why, when an impact is felt, it is not evident. That rabbit hole sort of looks like this: s/he knows that s/he is hurting me, so why do they keep doing it? Then we endlessly spiral out trying to read that human’s mind and make excuses for all the bad behavior. I am sorry to share this with you, but I am 100% positive that is always an exercise in futility. We’ve been through this before, but as a refresher: you will never know what someone else is thinking or why they are motivated in any particular direction.
That doesn’t stop us though. We obsess. We ponder. We torture ourselves. More often than not, we give that person the benefit of the doubt, when they absolutely do not deserve it. At all. We tell ourselves that the person is actually doing the opposite. They are ignoring us because they DON’T want to hurt us. They are being cold because they DON’T want to lead us on. They are blowing us off because they are confused and DON’T want to suck us into their own personal tumult and drama.
Oh my goodness, stop the madness. Please.
I don’t think that you need to believe that all people suck to accept the fact that most people are self-directed. I don’t believe that it is a catastrophe to accept that our own harm should and can be most meaningful to us. I don’t even think that it makes someone a bad person to acknowledge that they aren’t rocked by our harm.
Of course, there are shitty people in the world. There are hurt people who are looking to hurt people. There are also many, many people who are just trying to get by. They are just trying to get through the day and for them, that means putting the biggest focus on themselves. They just don’t have the bandwidth to worry about someone else.
Let’s put this in the silliest context possible. Ready? We are walking through a venue or space and someone bumps into us (pretend it’s 2019), and they don’t acknowledge the jolt. In fact, they just keep on walking. Most of the time, our immediate reaction is to bristle. How could that person slam us and not even realize? Didn’t they feel our solid form make contact with theirs? Didn’t they recognize they were to blame for this collision? Don’t they feel compelled to apologize?
Easy. It’s easy for them to bump into us and not realize. Why? They are in their own head. They are trying to get somewhere and they are either singularly focused on that journey or the one thousand other things they have going on in their lives and running through their brains. If I had to guess, I would tell you that most of the time, the person didn’t even feel the jolt of another solid form. They were so lost in their own goals and patterns, that the physical impact was inconsequential. If they did feel the crash, I imagine they blamed it on whomever they fell into, or at a minimum, shared the responsibility equally amongst the parties.
That is a benign example, of course, and life really isn’t that easy or simple. However, the underlying analysis is the same whether you are bumping into another person in the train station or dealing with the emotional fall out of a breakup.
After each relationship of mine ended, I spent an awful lot of time focusing on how little my ex cared about my harm. I always told myself that “he” cared, but was trying to do the right thing by separating. Or, I told myself that “he” was an asshole who never really cared, period. You know what I didn’t do? Focus on my own suffering and figure out a path towards healing. I did eventually, but it took some time. Too much time. Time that could have been better spent watching the sunset or eating ice cream.
So, step one is owning that your harm doesn’t need to impact anyone else. You cannot control that, so you better let it go. You can judge another for not being impacted, but that’s a lot of energy spent on something that’s really nothing. It’s your harm. Feel it. Own it. Worry about how you are going to heal it.
x.
L.
thepathtoworthy.com 